The Crystal Variation (146 page)

“And now,” he said, lowering the book. “I believe Jethri has a paper to read, after which he and I have business. Shall we proceed?”

Miandra moved to the table and picked up one of the novels, carrying it back to the window with her. The Scout resettled himself on the edge of the table. Jethri went to the black corner table, pushed the photocube of strangers back, unfolded the paper and smoothed it flat with his palm.

Despite that by now he read Liaden as good or better than he’d ever read Terran, it was dense going. Stoically, he kept with it and finally arrived at the last word with the understanding that the Liaden Scouts were, indeed, specifically charged with the confiscation, evaluation and appropriate disposal of “Old War technology,” such technology having been designated, by an action of the Council of Clans, meeting at Solcintra City, Liad, “perilous in manufacture and intent.”

Sighing, he straightened, and turned.

Miandra was sitting in his desk chair, seriously involved with her novel. The Scout was reading Jethri’s old pretend journal.

“I shouldn’t think that would hold much interest for you, sir,” he said, moving forward, and slipping a hand into his most secret pocket.

Captain ter’Astin glanced up, bounced to his feet, turning to put the book back in its place.

“The workings of mind and custom are always of interest to me,” he said. “It is the reason I am a Scout—and a field Scout, at that.”

Jethri looked at him sharply. The Scout inclined his head.

“So tell me, Jethri Gobelyn, are you satisfied that the disposal of Old War technology falls within the honor of the Scouts, and that such disposal is mandated by whole law?”

“Unfortunately, I am.” He placed the weather machine, lingeringly, on the table, and stood there, feeling kind of dry and gone in the throat of a sudden, staring down into the unreflective black surface.

“Ah.” Captain ter’Astin put a hand on Jethri’s sleeve. “I regret your loss. I believe you had told Scout yo’Shomin that this device was given you by a kinsman?”

Jethri licked his lips.

“It was a gift from my father,” he told the Scout. “After his death, I was without it for many years. It was only recently returned to me, with—” He waved a hand, enclosing the photocubes, Arin’s box and the silly old journal— “other things of value.”

“Accept my condolences,” the Scout said softly. The pressure of his fingers increased briefly, then he withdrew his hand and picked up the weather machine, slipping it away somewhere inside his jacket.

Jethri cleared his throat. “I wonder if you might tell me if you will yourself be involved in the—evaluation—of this device. Whether it will be—will simply be destroyed, or if the work that my father did will be preserved.”

The Scout’s eyebrows rose. “Yes. I would say that you take polish very well, indeed.” He paused, possibly gathering his thoughts, then inclined his head.

“I may possibly be asked for a preliminary evaluation; I do have some small expertise in the area. However, you must understand that there is a corps of Scout Experts, who have studied, built databases and cross-referenced their findings through the many dozens of Standards that this policy has been in force. If it is found that your machine, here, is unique, then it will undergo the most intense scrutiny possible by those who are entirely knowledgeable. Many of the old technology pieces that we have recovered are uniquities—that is, we have recovered only one.”

Jethri bowed his gratitude. “I thank you, sir.”

“Unnecessary, I assure you. A word in your ear, however, child.”

“Yes?”

“It might be wisest not to state in public that such devices were part of your father’s work.”

Jethri frowned. “Old technology is not illegal, in Terran space,” he said, evenly.

“Very true,” the Scout said and it seemed to Jethri that he was about to say more.

“Is this your father?” Miandra asked from behind them.

Jethri turned, and saw her holding up the photocube, Arin’s picture on the screen.

“Yes—that’s him.”

She turned it ‘round to face her. “You resemble him extremely, Jethri. I had supposed him to be your elder brother.”

“May I see?” The Scout extended a hand, and Miandra gave him the cube.

“Ah, yes, that is how I saw him, on the day of his dying. Strong, doubt free and worthy. A remarkable likeness, indeed.” Bowing slightly, he handed the cube back.

“Now, children, I suggest that we adjourn to Scout Hall, where Jethri may sign the necessary paperwork and we may place this item—” He touched the breast of his jacket—”into safekeeping. We will also contact the Healers, to advise them of Lady Miandra’s guesting arrangements, and to confirm the time of her arrival tomorrow.
After
which, I ask you both to lend me the pleasure of your companionship over prime. There is a restaurant on Irikwaeport which has long been a favorite of mine. I would be honored to share it with friends.”

Jethri glanced to Miandra, saw her eyes shining and her face looking less pinched, and bowed to the Scout.

“We are more than pleased to bear you company, sir. Lead on.”

Day 178

DAY 178

Standard Year 1118

Irikwae

IT WAS AN OLD pod
, though he’d seen older; the seals were sound, the skin whole and undented. It rested on a cradle meant for a pod decades newer and massing twice as much; though its fittings could be said to be standard they were of an older and unfavored style. At some time in the past—perhaps not all that long ago—it had been underwater and a colony of hard-shells, now empty, still adhered to the hull. On the nose was a Liaden registry number, faint, but readable.

Jethri finished his circuit and paused, considering the thing as a whole.

“Well?” asked Tan Sim, who had been watching, one hip up on the wide windowsill, one booted foot braced against the rough crete floor. “Shall you take it for your own?”

Jethri turned. “You know what is in this pod,” he said, not asking.

Tan Sim blinked, and then bowed slightly from his lean. “I know what was on the manifest,” he said, “and the devil’s own time I had finding it, too.”

“So?” Jethri walked toward him. “What were they shipping? Flegetets, dead and rotted, these sixty years? Cheeses, moldy and poisonous? Wine, now vinegar?”

Tan Sim moved a shoulder, grimacing. The bruises had risen with a will overnight, leaving his face a patchwork of yellow and purple.

“Mind you,” he said, raising a hand. “I could only trace the registry number, which is in series with those ceded Clan Dartom, some sixty Standards gone. Indeed, Clan Dartom is itself fifty Standards gone, and nothing to say but that this pod was sold and sold again on the unregistered market.”

“Clan Dartom is—gone?” Jethri asked, thinking epic scales of revenge, like in one of Khat’s stories—or Gaenor’s novels.

“Peace,” Tan Sim said, as if he had read Jethri’s thoughts—or was perhaps himself a reader of novels. “Dartom was based upon a young outworld; a plague destroyed them and the rest of the population, very speedily. Not even a kitten left alive. Medical analysis failed to produce anyone who might even be named a cousin.” He waved a languid hand in the direction of the pod.

“So, Dartom’s remaining uncontaminated assets fell to the Council of Clans, which took what it wanted, and distributed the remainder by lot. They then wrote Dartom out of the Book of Clans, and put paid to the matter.”

“Anyone could have bought this pod at auction, then,” Jethri said. “Or, as you say, on the unregistered market. And those who buy such things sometimes have unregistered business.”

“In pursuit of which they would be foolish in the extreme to file a manifest,” Tan Sim agreed.

Jethri turned back to the pod, and once again subjected the seals to the most minute scrutiny possible. Unbreached. Impossible to tell how long they had been sealed.

“You found a manifest,” he said, turning back to Tan Sim. “How long ago?”

“Fifty-three years, which does put it in a . . . problematic time frame.”

“The pod spent some time in the sea,” Jethri pointed out.

“True, but we have no date there, either.” Tan Sim turned his palms up, showing them empty. “Indeed, we have but one firm date: The salvage rig’s log shows that it was brought into port two Standards back, when it was purchased by this yard, in lot with another dozen newer. This—” Tan Sim wiggled his fingers in the pod’s general direction. “This was on the list for break-up, but the scrap market is over-subscribed and there is for the scrappers the considerable risk involved in taking possession of unknown goods.”

“So they would just as soon sell it and shift the risk to other shoulders.” Jethri sighed. “The manifest is public record?” he asked.

“My friend, public record?” Tan Sim bent upon him a look of gentle reproof. “The manifest had been sealed, then deep archived after the seal expired. Your average salvager, with his mind properly on scrap, is hardly busy mucking about in municipal archives, much less completing the rather daunting forms required by the Guild before one who is not a trader may request permission to pull and cross-reference ancient databases.”

Jethri bowed acknowledgment, offering honor for a difficult task well-performed.

Tan Sim’s bow of acceptance was nearly lost against the wall of Jethri’s thought.

Jethri looked back to the pod. He
liked
it. He couldn’t have put it otherwise, except that he had a good feeling about whatever might prove to be inside.

“What was on the manifest?”

“Ore, raw gem, artisan’s metals.”

Nonperishables. High-profit nonperishables, at that. If it was the right manifest. If it was the right pod, for that matter, it not being unknown for someone to borrow the legitimate registration number of a legitimate pod for illegitimate business.

“Buy the pod, sell the contents and realize more than enough profit to have the clamps refitted,” he said. Again Tan Sim lifted a shoulder.

“A manifest, which may or may not be legitimate, for a pod which may or may not be this one? If I were plumper in the purse—perhaps. My present purse instructs me to assume that what is in that pod are dead flegetets, moldy cheese, and spoiled wine.”

Jethri had done the math last night, worrying over his liquid. It were the Stinks money that made the difference—not quite enough to fund a ship, like Khat had joked, but close enough to fund this deal, after reserving an amount against the future. ‘Course, there was more than enough money in his certification drawing account to cover the pod—and the clamps, too—but he didn’t think the hall exactly wanted him to be using those funds for private deals.

“I will put four kais against the pod,” he said to Tan Sim, “if we agree that the contents, whatever they are found to be, are mine, while the pod itself is yours.”

Tan Sim raised his eyebrows, face thoughtful. Doing his own math, Jethri thought, and settled himself to wait.

“Four-six,” Tan Sim said, eventually, which was about half the jump Jethri had been prepared to meet.

He inclined his head. “Done. Now, we shall need the pod moved to a less precarious position. What do you suggest?”

“As to that—nothing easier. The refit shop will send a hauler. They assured me that they have the means to unseal the pod without damaging the mechanisms, so the day after tomorrow should see an answer to your gamble. After which,” he said, coming creakily out of his lean, “you may have free with whatever it is, and the shop will get on with the business of the clamps.”

Jethri looked at him, and Tan Sim had the grace to look, just a little, discomfited.

“I thought you might do something like you have done,” he said, softly. “So I made inquiries yesterday after we had parted.” He sighed.

“I hope you will realize great profit, Jeth Ree.”

“As to that,” Jethri retorted. “I hope for a decent return.”

Tan Sim grinned and offered his arm. “Spoken like a trader! Come, let us give the yardman his deposit and return to the hall to write the partnership papers.”

THE PARTNERSHIP CONTRACT
having been duly written, accepted and recorded by the hall scrivener, Jethri bounded up the stairs to his quarters, Tan Sim on his heels.

“Come and call the refit shop, so they may schedule an early pickup,” he said as they moved down the hall. “For the salvage price—my part is in coin, which I will give to you, and you may transfer the balance to the yard.”

Tan Sim smiled. “Such trusting ways. How if we both put our coin into the revolving account and authorize the hall to make the transfer in our names?”

Jethri paused in the act of unlocking the door to stare at him. “I had no idea such a thing was possible.”

“Innocent. When we have sent the transfer, I will quiz you on the services a trader might expect a third-tier hall to provide.”

The lock twittered and Jethri pushed the door open. “Is Irikwae in the third—” he began—and stopped, staring into his room.

All was neat and orderly, precisely as he had left it, with one addition.

Miandra sat cross-legged on his work table, reading a book.

Behind him, Tan Sim made a small noise, very much like a sneeze.

Miandra raised her head, showing them a face that was eerily serene.

“Cousin Jethri,” she said clearly. “We need to talk.”

Uh-oh.

“Certainly,” Tan Sim said briskly, “the necessities of kin carry all before it. Jeth Ree, I will make that call from the Trade Bar and meet you there, when you have done here. Lady.”

Jethri turned, but the door was already closing, with Tan Sim on the other side. He engaged the lock, then walked over to where Miandra sat, and stood looking down into her face.

She met his gaze without flinching, chin well up, an I-dare-you look in her eyes.

He sighed.

“How much trouble are you in?”

The chin might’ve quivered; the eyes never faltered.

“None, until they find me.”

Well, that was the way it usually was, wasn’t it? Jethri frowned.

“I thought you wanted my help.”

She bit her lip. “I—indeed, Jethri, I am not certain what is that you might do. But I
will not
remain with the Healers, and I—fear—that I
cannot
go home . . .”